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M97 Owl Nebula

This is a planetary nebula around 2,600 light years away.

Planetary nebula is formed after a star very much like our own Sun burns through all it's fuel. The star swells up in size and then rapidly shrinks right down to become a white dwarf. As it shrinks, it's gaseous outer layers are left to just simply drift outwards continually expanding. This particular one is approximately 2 light years across.

It gets it's name the Owl Nebula from the two dark patches that kind of look like big beady eyes.

 

 

Boring techie bit.

Skywatcher quattro 8" S & f4 aplanatic coma corrector

EQ6 R pro mount guided with an Altair 50mm & Altair GPcam

Canon 450D astro modded with Astronomik CLS CCD EOS APS-C clip filter. Neewer Intervalometer used to control the exposures.

60 - 2 minute exposures with the best 70% stacked in DeepSkyStacker with calibration frames.

All other processing done with StarTools.

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Uploaded on January 25, 2023